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Twisted MPs, don’t ya love ‘em?

Should Employment Minister Tony McNulty be sacked over his £60k ‘second home’ claims?

Published on March 23rd 2009.

The Results..

Yes:

- 88%

No:

- 12%

Why doesn’t Gordon just sack him?

It’s such a blatant and flagrant abuse of public money that he should be put in stocks outside Westminster Abbey and bombarded with rotten fruit cunningly fashioned into the image of fat cats.

Yep we’re talking Tony McNulty, employment minister, who could give plenty of advice to jobseekers on the way to handle expenses. McNutty claimed an estimated £60,000 for a property he said he was sharing with his parents in his Harrow East constituency, in north-west London.

All MPs, apart from those who represent inner London constituencies, can claim up to £24,000 a year towards the cost of staying away from home while on Parliamentary business.

Apparently the fact that his main home is technically outside inner London in Hammersmith made McShifty think that the tax payer would love to cover his second home costs of using his parents’ home in Harrow – all of 11 miles from the House of Commons (and eight miles from his main home).

He has said he made "considerable" use of the Harrow property and that it allowed him to do his job more effectively from within his constituency of Harrow East.

He stopped claiming the allowances in January because the fall in interest rates meant he could afford to pay the mortgage from his MP's salary at the Hammersmith home he shares with his wife Christine Gilbert, the chief inspector of schools.

Ah, bless.

Officially he didn’t break the rules. Officially he’d found a loophole to slip through. Officially he doesn’t have to pay a penny back.

Tony McNulty puts finishing touches to his second home

But a former chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, Sir Alistair Graham, has said to the BBC: "He (Mr McNutty) talks about using it as a base to do constituency work, but he didn't say that he stayed overnight there. If he was not staying overnight there, and the claim is probably a bit dodgy anyway, there should be some money repaid."

As we’ve stated McNutty claimed that he didn’t break the rules. We say listen Tony if you’d been caught with your pants down having a cheeky go at Hazel Blears then we would have endorsed and defended your right to privacy. It wouldn’t matter.But there is the law and the spirit of the law. You didn’t break the former but you turned the latter into meaningless mush.

What about doing the honourable thing, eh?

Let’s find a sword for you to jump on shall we?

Vote on the Homepage over whether you think McNulty should be sacked.

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Cigpapers why bother, there never ever will be a BNP government because most intelligent people will never vote in enough numbers to allow to happen. The BNP are irrelevant, a voice howling in the wilderness, and many of them, not you maybe mate, are thuggish. We are sensible in this country to have a first past the post system which means little parties for the discredited and the malcontent (left as well as right) will never get a real voice which daft proportional respresentation might let slip in.

He hasn't broken any rules but the rules should now be changed and he should pay the money back as a gesture towards proving the government isn't as corrupt as we're all starting to think it is. Maybe we should just stop this masquerade of paying tax and set up a direct debit to the House of Commons. Democracy my ass. I could cry with the unfairness of how our government is run.

He's stuck to the letter of the law, no doubt. Bring on the inevitable far-reaching root-and-branch investigations that will get us back to exactly the same spot but millions lighter. While many politicians go in to Westminster with the very best of intentions, it seems the clublike atmosphere and quiet words of advice bring so very many down to the level of "It's fine, everyone's at it, no point missing out". The letter may be met, but the spirit of these regulations is greeted with the slammed door f a secondary residence.Do away with secondary residences. Have a constituency home for each MP and - if that is outside London - give them a room in a parliamentary hall of residence. If they don't want to stay there, then let them pay their own way while fulfilling their obligations in Westminster. Like politicians are so fond of telling us: If you've got nothing to hide......

Ali, there is a rule that states no member will bring the House into disrepute nor do anything that may be conceived as being against the spirit of the rules or the House. Surely this fits the bill for that! He's a snivelling idiot.

It would not be a good idea to vote BNP in as they are a racist party and we certainly do not want that in Britain. What we do want is someone to create a party that will get Britain back on its feet: stop all this political correctness, stop telling us what to eat, how much we can drink, not to smoke etc. etc. England is a very good place to live if you are bone idle, have loads of kids etc. etc. I feel sorry for the next generation.

For MP's these days the question seems not to be "is it right?" but rather "Can I fit it within the rules?" Conscience has been replaced by compliance. This is what comes of having a parliament full of career politicians with no real connection to the life the rest of us live. If McNulty had a shred of the honour that Parliament guards so jealously, he would have resigned long since. But as a shameless hypocrite he will hang on till the last possible moment.

My understanding is that he stopped claiming after a newspaper asked him about it.Calls for his resignation and for him to pay the money back totally miss the point.With all the pressure that Gordon Mugabe Brown is under you would think the spineless, useless, one-eyed toad would DO SOMETHING.They'll chase a doley for a quid overpaid yet this SCUM from ALL party's suelch and squirm in the trough.Politicians now rank lower than paedophiles in social status

He shouldn't be sacked because he stuck within the rules. The system needs looking at and thoroughly updating. MP's get far more monetary perks than can be properly checked and things like the second home allowance need to be stopped.

Another point on this! MP's are paid 63k a year, this chap is a minister so on 144k a year and will have a gold plated pension to match. They can also claim for staff, offices and anything else they can loosely claim has anything to do with work.It was previously thought that MP's were not very well paid so all the perks were more acceptable, however since Labour came to power the starting wage of an MP has increased by 24k a year which in itself is over the annual average wage! I wonder when all these Labour lefties will realise that their 'working class' Labour party is nothing of the sort and have found numerous ways to fleece more from us each year. The modern MP is paid much much then they ever have been. I chuckle when the lefties proclaim the 'Torys' to be the anti working class party. The Labour party tell you want you want to hear guys and then go off and change rules to suit themselves, then anytime the usual Labour party support gets a bit miffed with this, they know a few jibes at the Conservatives of being 'toffs', 'out of touch', 'public school boys' and that brings everything back to normal. MP's like Tony McNulty and his cronies must laugh at those Labour supporters, and we all know some, who will only vote Labour 'cos my dad did and his dad did and his dad did and.........'

Mcnulty etc, just like bankersin the media seem like sacrifical lambs, makes me wonder if the ones we get to hear about have done something else wrong or area a liability , so they get kicked out of 'the club' as useful scapegoats. We all get hysterical and the rest of the pigs in the trough just dig in a bit deeper and hide their truffles better.We need a radical change - is it ok to say revolution or will i be on some database now as a radical agitator?

Very true Anonymous - a lot of these cases are when Politicos who are a " bit bent " try whistle blowing on the really evil corruption like paedophillia and the " mob " turn on them. It's like Big Brother - if you break with the group, the group break you!

You know, we don't have to vote for him. I wouldn't want some unelected civil servant holding our representatives to account. That's our job. I'm no George Galloway fan, but I don't think he should have had a ban from Parliamant, likewise with Ken Livingstone when he was suspended as London Mayor.There's a long history of "removing" people's chosen representatives on a quasi-legal basis and we don't get anything out of it other than losing control.If you don't like it stop voting for them. If it was clear he wasn't going to be re-elected, and nor was any party that had him in it, then he would be gone pretty quickly.But then all this is a distraction from his pretty rubbish job in my opinion as a politician. Its really that he needs to be held to account for.

Isn't it about time we got away from this whole idea of voting? We all know on Xfactor, Big Brother etc etc the country tends to vote for the freak or sob story case or downright loser - so what can we expect with elections? Lets be honest, in some areas not so far away Labour could put up a chicken and win. Voting should be kept for tax payers and those recently made redundant. If some slob who hasn't worked a day in his life votes, it's going to be for someone to give him a kick up the jacksie! And I fail to remember anyone voting Labour in with Gordon Brown as leader, even those who'd vote for a chicken!

Lets face it a bunch of self regulating people out of touch with reality are going to stop looking at the real issue THAT THEY ARE SPENDING OUR MONEY, I have been camping for the last 5 years so my kids can enjoy a family holiday. By the way yes both parents work and we pay all our bills,so how can the He didn't break any rules statement matter. He (they) are spending our money on second homes that are not sold and the funds given to the tax payer or even back to the government. Stop this lunacy now pay them a salary, buy accommodation of a decent standard from tax funds give them all a standard rail pass and allow them to keep in touch with the masses.By them of course I mean Mp's and Minsters.